Dentists do the funniest things

I had a dentists appointment today. I was scared. I hadn't been to a dentist in about 3 years, when I had two root canals and had an entire tooth rebuilt from scratch. When I was pregnant, my wisdom teeth started growing in, and caused a HUGE amount of pain, but because I knew they couldn't do anything (because I was pregnant) I didn't bother to have them seen to. The pain went away, I assumed all was well.
It wasn't. From then until now, every few months the pain flared up and I spent a week or so crying and clutching my head.
I also, in the course of my labour, chipped the tooth I'd had rebuilt at a cost of £350. Not. A. Happy. Bunny.

So after 11 months of faffing and procrastinating and avoiding, I went to the dentist. It's worse than I thought. My left wisdom tooth is growing in sideways. Not at a slight angle. Not a bit wonky. Actually almost fully sideways. This image gives you a pretty good idea of what I'm talking about. So I have to go to hospital and have it removed, probably under general anaesthetic. The waiting list is about a month long, so I'm not even sure when it's going to happen. I'm asking A.B's godmother to help me out by babysitting on the day, but I'm pretty nervous. I'm not sure whether the drugs they give me will affect my breastmilk, how long it'll take, how much pain I'll be in...it's all very worrying for someone who likes to know what's happening and doesn't like uncertainty.

I also have to have the chipped tooth capped. They're doing a silver cap, because I get free treatment, which I am SERIOUSLY unhappy about, since I paid fucking £350 3 years ago to have the tooth replaced in WHITE. Now I'm going to have a horrible ugly silver thing in my face. You couldn't even tell it wasn't my real tooth before. But we don't have the money to get it fixed 'properly'. Aaaaaahhh. I am SO glad that I get free tretment, please don't misunderstand. I am more angry that the previous dentist charged me so much money for something that didn't last.

I'm watching random snippets of Stephen Fry on Youtube. He makes me happy in my pants.

94lbs

It's 'funny' how the less I weigh, the less I want to eat. I just don't see the point anymore. I never gain weight, it never gets better, nothing ever helps. My BMI hasn't been above 15 for months. I've been struggling for months and months to get it up and nothing ever works.

I'm just so tired of fighting this and never getting anywhere.

Ganked from BendyGirl

Birthdays suck

So, I turned 22 on Sunday, and it sucked. I won't go into detail, because a LOT of stuff happened, but it was just a horrible day in general and involved a big falling out with Mr A's family. I spent about an hour solid just sobbing in a way I haven't done for years. Needless to say, it failed in every aspect as a birthday. We're trying again on July 6th, hoping 22 v2 goes better.

Today we also got a letter from the council. The council ALWAYS send their damn letters so they arrive on a FRIDAY so you can't fucking do anything about them. We had applied for housing assistance (yes yes, I'm a horrible benefit-scrounging loser, I know, but please bear in mind that we are roughly £1000 a month below the poverty line [the poverty line here being less than 60% of the median UK income after housing costs have been paid] so I'm sorry, but we do need government assistance. And if you disagree you can come and live in my house with my budget for a year without any. Then we'll talk.) and when Mr A handed in the forms, the woman insisted on putting down that we were applying for Working Tax Credits and Child Tax Credits at the same time, even though we weren't, she said we HAD to. So today we got a letter through saying that they would not assess our claim until they had seen documentation of what we were awarded in WTC and CTC. Guys, we havent even received those forms yet. They need to be sent to you, apparently, and we havent got them yet. We then have to SHOW the Housing people our filled-out forms AND show them the letter detailing what we've been awarded. We won't have the forms until next week at the earliest and we won't hear back from then for at least two weeks, add another week to sort things out with housing and two weeks for them to make a decision, and we won't be getting our back-payment and our payments for over a month, at the earliest.
On top of this, theres a box on the form asking why you haven't filled it in any sooner, and we put that Mr A is working full-time and when he's not, he's looking after me and helping me look after Baby A.B. When Mr A took the form in the woman was SO snotty about it, saying why hadn't I bothered to come down, and what was so wrong with me that I couldn't get out the house. I should point out that the form clearly states I am in receipt of the FULL amount of Disability Living Allowance. Nothing on this form should have led her to think I sit on my arse all day thinking of essential tasks I can shirk. Along with the letter above, we get a letter saying that we have to provide PROOF that I have been ill in the time-period we're talking about, which means supplying a fucking note from my GP. Er, except, my GP doesn't KNOW about my PND. You know why? BECAUSE I AM NOT OBLIGATED TO REPORT ON MY HEALTH TO MY GP. If I want to keep that shit secret, I'm ALLOWED. I am so ANGRY. It was clearly stated on the form that I have post-natal depression, Mr A works full-time, leaving at 7 and getting back at 6:30, when is he supposed to be able to go there? And I'm angry too that I'm being ordered to produce proof of my depression when that isn't even relevant to our case, only to the time-line of when we handed the form in. I don't go to my GP for every sniffle, I was sick for 6 weeks earlier in the year, immobilised for weeks at a time and I didn't go to him then (mainly out of stubbornness and because their appointment booking system is ridiculous) so why would I go to him with something so personal and difficult?
Yes I know I shouldn't be bitching about all my free money....I'm not really, I'm just upset about all the rudeness we get from them and all the red tape and things that stand in our way just to get help. You have to fill out a 50 page form and then supply 600 bits of paper and then get grilled by a super-rude bitch and then 10 days later get told 'Oh well thats not enough'. They want you to give up before they have to give you anything. Why can't they just be nice? Like asking for help isn't daunting and demoralising enough, they need to beat you around and make you jump through hoops and feel like shit on their shoes. It's so unnecessary.


What else sucks? Well... one of our pet rats died this week. The other won't be around much longer. I have a dentist appointment for Tuesday which is scary and I-want-to-avoid-y. The company delivering my replacement credit card (part of the Birthday Of Suckiness, my e-bay/paypal/email account got hacked into on my birthday so I had to cancel all my cards) has my address SO wrong it's baffling that the letter even arrived to tell us they couldnt find our house.

Right, I'm off to go watch Secret Life of The American Teenager and pretend my life is awesome.

It's a bad sign when..

...you google yourself to see what people you're getting into fights with online who know your full real name will find if THEY google you.

Guys, that should NEVER be a concern.

What do people find when they google me? Oh god. Well mostly, random listings websites that don't really do anything other than list my name. But also, a link to my poetry on a writing website (I tried to erase that link but it didn't work. Damnit! It's *very* incriminating.), pictures of me on my wedding day, my goodreads account (not terribly incriminating, that) and a bunch of dud links to my facebook account (which is so private that even if you click on them and search, knowing my full name, you get nada)

Once again I am kind of floored by the internet and the scary scary things on it. I'm also now stuck in the whole cycle of clicking through the profiles of people I used to know, to be friends with...getting sucked into that vortex of pain is NOT goodtimes.

But hey, at least if the people I'm in a dispute with see my crazy 16-yr-old poetry, they'll back the fuck off and leave me alone because they'll assume I'm certifiably insane.

CAKE

or, How I Burned My Face Melting Butter.

Today in my little corner of the world, it's a bank holiday. This doesn't actually affect me, since my husband is off work anyway and I don't have a job and we weren't planning on doing anything. BUT I feel the need to use 'it's a bank holiday' as my excuse for trying to make cake for dinner tonight, and the chaos that ensued.

I was making no-bake tiffin cakes, a'la My Daddy Cooks. Because it's easy and because tiffin cakes are yummy and because we had all the ingredients. Which is pretty much my criteria for making anything.
First I had to crush the biscuits. Nick recommends doing this in a bag, but again, I'm lazy and couldnt be bothered to find a bag, plus I like mine crushed a little finer than the bag allows for. So I just break them by hand and then complain about how long and arduous this process is. Tonight I managed to rub my skin raw breaking biscuits, which is a) ridiculous, and b) kind of deeply deeply gross. I have decided it's ok however, because no one else will be eating them and I'm pretty sure Mr A doesn't mind eating a little bit of my skin. Lets face it, we're a married couple, he's done worse.
So now I have really painful hands, which are silky smooth but that's only nice for anyone I'm touching, not so nice for me, who has been rubbed raw. Next I have to melt some butter. Simple? Oh. Oh no. Not simple at all, apparently, because when I put the butter in the pan, it all goes horribly, inexplicably, wrong. First clouds of smoke, thick, grey, solid-looking smoke, issue out of the pan in quantities I've never seen issue from anything in my life. It is EVERYWHERE. I turn the heat off and move the pan, but it doesn't stop. Mr A comes to the rescue, opening the back door and telling me to calm down. Once the smoke stops, I resume cooking, except it's not over yet. As soon as I put the rest of the butter in the pan, it starts EXPLODING IN MY FACE. Yes, you read that right. EXPLODING all up in my FACE. Then it starts exploding EVERYWHERE. I'm screaming, Mr A has Baby A and so can't come and rescue me, I back off from the pan but now I'm trapped in the corner of the room while the pan is still on the heat, volcanic bursts of boiling butter spewing forth every few seconds, coating everything in a five foot radius, including my face and arms.
Eventually I grabbed a towel, covered myself and moved in on it. This minimized the damage, but didn't stop it all together. I was terrified every time I heard the pop and bang and felt hot fat hit me through the towel.

I've just surveyed the damage, and my entire kitchen, including the clean clothes and nappies hanging up to dry, is covered in big fat droplets of grease. I did a quick wash of the floor but it's going to need heavy duty work tomorrow to get it properly usable again.

Ugh. Bloody bank holiday Monday. Why didn't I just make toast?

Imploding laptops and a fortnight of duelling

So the other day my laptop imploded. We knew it was coming, sort of. The little plastic bits on the back that kept the lid up had snapped off and so the wires leading from the screen to the base were exposed and rubbing. It was really only a matter of time before it died.
Of course, knowing it was coming didn't inspire me to do anything about being able to rescue all my vital information once it DID happen. Oh nooooo. One morning I turned my laptop on and got the grey fuzzy screen of death. So I hauled out the netbook that came free with my blackberry that I tried to sell but that no one wanted to buy. And I quickly learned WHY no one wanted to buy it. I hate it. It has teeny tiny keys on a keyboard clearly designed for pixies, not real human beings, the auto-updates keep messing with my internet settings, the sound quality is worse than awful, and the right click on the mouse stopped working after two days. Awesome. I have provided above some evidence of the tinyness of the netbook, to give you a better idea of my pain. I dont have large hands, you guys. My ring size is H/I (please to admire the sparkly on my ring finger, plz)
BUT. BUT. At least I still have something. The internet is my therapy, my friend, and my link to the outside world on the days when I can't interract with it properly. Without it, I'd pretty much be lost. So fr now I hold a grudging truce with the Netbook of Death and we shake hands, not as friends, but not as foes either.

So, Mr A's company offered him a pretty sweet deal to have some time off, and we'd been having ishoo's within our marriage and with my health and with A.B too, so he jumped at the chance. We're on Friday of the first week and it's been nice. Stressful at times, he plays too much playstation and doesn't take enough initiative with things that need to get done, but still, it's good. We are bickering a lot more but also spending more quality time together and being more loving. Ahhh. Sweet. He's alright really, sometimes. Now if only he'd put the playstation controller down and take the fucking bins out on time, we'd be in business.

Things I will totally do this summer. Probably.

1. Go swimming. This was originally going to be 'Go swimming every week' and then 'Go swimming every month' and then I decided to be vaguely realistic.
2. Get the house spotlessly clean. For at least one day.
3. Sew at least once a week.
4. Do an hour of housework a day each weekday.

-STOP-

That list fucking sucks. Ahhhh. When I first started this entry it was supposed to be an AWESOME list of FUN and AWESOME. Now it's a to-do list of chores. I have a feeling my list should actually be more like 'Learn to ride a motorbike!' 'Take salsa classes!' 'Have coffee with a hobo!' 'Run away to Paris for a week!' but that doesn't seem like a good list to write. I think it would probably just depress me.

Money is set to be bad this month. It's always bad, but this month its going to be especially bad. Mr A has the next 11 days off work and we'll be able to speak to the council about benefits we should be recieving, but that will take at least 3 weeks to come through. In the meantime we'll be living on vapours. Funtimes. Once again I'm disgustingly thankful that we use cloth nappies and I breastfeed. We wouldn't be able to afford nappies or formula this month.

Sobriety, illness, PND, and pork

Today has been bad. Like, really bad. Like, raging-PND-that-you're-not-supposed-to-admit-to, mentally-counting-all-the-pills-in-the-house, shaking-in-a-corner bad.

First of all, Mini-A is being a shit. It's not really her fault, she's teething and has a cold and that sucks for her, but she is also being a shit. I have bruises and welts and scabs and broken blood vessels from where she has been....what word fits? It's not assault or abuse because there's no intention. It's not playing, because that makes it sound much less malevolent than it is. She hurts me because she's angry, because she doesn't know her own strength, because she's frustrated. At under 10 months old, I really can't expect much from her in the way of self restraint. But days like today when I've been pummeled near non-stop and when she isn't hitting she's shouting, are tiring days. It doesn't matter that it's not her fault. It' not mine either and I just have to live with it.

We've talked about the PND before. It's there. It doesn't go away. But it's more managable some days. However today I got to the end of the day and I just wanted to not exist. I have been Sober With A Capital S for most of the last couple of years, falling off the wagon once or twice. The 2nd anniversary of the first major wagon fall is pressing down on us right now. Two years ago this month a dear friend took her own life and mine fell apart. I didn't do anything for 6 months. I lay in bed, I didn't talk to my husband. I drank. I smoked. I was a terrible person to be around. I have no memories of it. They just aren't there. So with this looming over me and Mr A's job getting more stressful every week and with A.B being 'difficult' and with my physical health ebbing, you may go some way towards understanding why I have a drink balanced on my knee right now. This drink and writing this entry is the only thing stopping me getting dressed and walking out the house. Ostensibly,to buy a packet of cigarettes, but in reality, I know I would find an excuse not to come back. Right now, it's That Bad.

Ask most mom's why they do what they do for their children, why they want the best for them, why they work so hard for them, and they'll be able to sum it up in one word: Love. Because they love them.
My huge shame and my greatest regret is that do my best, work my hardest, and try to do everything 'right' to make up for the fact that I don't love my daughter. It's the one thing she needs most and it's the only thing I can't give her. Instead I give her breastmilk and carefully chosen clothes and child-rearing methods that I've painstakingly researched to try to fill the gap that post-natal-depression has left between us. Maybe if I do a good enough job with everything else, it won't be too bad. Her father loves her, and I raise her kindly and carefully. Maybe that will be enough. Maybe it won't matter that I'm incapable of loving her. Maybe it will mean that when mental illness inevitably shuffles me off into the ante-room of existance it won't be too bad for her. It may even be a relief to finally be free of her un-mothering mother.
Meanwhile, I will lactate and make her pork chops (her favourite) and play the airplane game and pick out pretty clothes so that when she looks back on the pictures of herself as a baby, the pictures I'm never in, she'll feel the fact that even though I didn't love, I did care.

Moms, Jewish Convents, Zombies, and Foxes

I feel the need to show you the e-mail I just sent my mom, to prove to people that the way I write my blog is not a million miles from who I really am. I sometimes worry people think Blog-Me is an act I put on. Because I put on a lot of acts. I'm that sort of person.
Also, it's fucking amusing. To me, at least. And hopefully to my mom too. And even if she has no sense of humour, fuck it. It's mothers day, she has to pretend to love everything I do.

I was going to phone but some arsehole (Mr A) has helpfully removed the batteries from the phone without telling me, rendering it useless. Good thing I didn't need to phone the fire brigade or anything, RIGHT? ARSE.
Anyway, I hope the boys gave you (let you buy yourself) nice presents, and that you have a good day of chilling in the pool and reading. Bliss!!

Love you

x
PS: Have included a picture of A.B at her boyfriends 1st Birthday party. They have a love/hate relationship. There is LOVE! for a minute, and then there was hate for about 6 hours. Have also included a picture of said boyfriend, because he's fricking gorgeous and she's a lucky chick, snagging herself a handsome older guy. We've already told her though, this age difference? Alright when you're 9 months old. Not so alright when she'll be 15 and the equivalent age ratio would make a boyfriend 20. Mr A is still trying to figure out the Jewish equivalent of Convent school. I keep telling him they don't have one, it's just Schul and a lot of guilt and Yiddish and eye-rolling, but he refuses to believe there isn't somewhere paranoid Jew-y fathers can send their daughters. He says the Jews invented paranoia and it's basically why Christianity exists because you have to be pretty paranoid to think a guy that says he walks on water and turns it into wine but doesn't turn massive bodies of water into wine is a serious threat. I have to admit he has a point, but I don't think that changes the fact that the Jews seem to know better than to lock a bunch of teenage girls up in a school with only religion and hormones for company. Jews may be paranoid but they're not delusional. Except Jesus. He was a little delusional. But that's alright, he had cool party tricks. Plus he was pretty much the original zombie and everyone loves zombies.
PPS: Also, a fox. Because it was sweet and you have wallabee's and stuff, but can you look out your kitchen window and see a fox? NO, Madam. You CAN'T. So I must bring the fox. And bring the fox I shall. Consider yourself outfoxed.
PPPS: It's 5:40am. Does it show?

It's now 5:52am. So I'm out. Like a light. Except they don't go out, do they? They go off. So I never understood that phrase. You don't turn a light 'in', a light doesn't go 'in', it goes 'on', so why does it go 'out'?
Important fuckin' questions, y'all.

I pack it in real good

That title is pleasingly suggestive. It is making me giggle.

So it's 8:30am and so far today I have:
-Showered
-Dyed myself pink
-Scrubbed myself raw
-Tried out two hairstyles
-Fallen out of bed twice
-Had breakfast AND coffee
-Looked up all my directions for travelling later
-Had a stare-down with a rabbit
-Made scathing and witty political commentary via Facebook
-Made unscathing and unwitty skin-dying commentary via Twitter
-Waved off Mr A with a parting shot about not loving me because I'm pink now, just to keep him on his toes
-Given extremely serious thought to being productive in the kitchen
-Decided not to give into insanity (re: kitchen)

Now, given that by 8:30 on most mornings I am still dragging myself out of my comatose state while begging A.B to go-back-to-fucking-goddamn-sleep-please-baby-breath-mummy-loves-you-please-sleep-PLEASE, I think that this is actually pretty awesome going.

However, there are a few problems in this sudden burst of productivity. Most pressingly, I am pink. Bright pink. This would be fine if all I had to do all day was mooch around the house, scrubbing myself with Q-tips soaked in bleach. However, I actually have to leave the house in an hour and I'll be doing TWO seperate social functions today. A picnic with a friend and my very first kid's birthday party as a mother. It is pretty damn exciting. I feel like this is a rite of passage. Which I am going to complete while PINK. Secondly, I am also now pretty tired. Awesome. I'm going to fall asleep in that poor kids cake and ruin the whole damn party. All because I have a need for hair the color of raspberries.

10 Things You Should Hate About Me

1. I over-use the words Really, Seriously, Actually, Ridiculously and Also. I don't think I can get through a paragraph without using one of them. It's a disease.

2. I have bad taste. In everything. I like tasteless things on both ends of the spectrum, too. I'm talking 'Mommy drinks because I cry' t-shirts for babies AND floral ruffled romper suits. My bad taste does not discriminate.

3. I swear like a sailor. I also swear in front of the baby. Fuck it. The day she accidentally swears in front of her grandparents will be the proudest day of my life.

4. I'm needy. Ridiculously so. Like right now? I'm considering waking my husband up so he can tell me I'm pretty.

5. I'm a snob. Pretty much about everything, but only if I don't like you. I WILL argue with you for years about the pronunciation of 'scone' and I will totally sneer at you if you have Twilight as your 'favourite book' even though I've read the entire series cover to cover four times. It's just how I roll.

6. I'm not a nice person. I'm just not. I'm not one of those people who is just *nice*. I'm pretty much only nice if I love you. Luckily, I love easily.

7. I'm unflinchingly self-obsessed. ME ME ME ME ME. Everything is about me.

8. I have no self-esteem, which makes me paranoid, obsessive, mean, spiteful, pathetic, whingey, two-faced, and introverted. You will almost never see the 'real me' unless you know me for years, or unless I am SO DRUNK, but now that I'm sober, that's unlikely to happen. (sobriety is fucking boring as hell.)

9. I'm so vain I can't even think of ten things you should hate. So you tell ME what the tenth thing is. What do you hate about me?

One of those days

When I really really really wish I had woken up with an infectious disease that would force me to stay home.

Firstly, my wake-up. A package came in the morning, which required me leaping out of bed when the doorbell went and flying down three flights of stairs, detouring halfway to grab a dressing gown, standing on A.B's little plastic octopus of EVIL, screaming 'FUCK FUCK FUCK OWWWING FUCK!' while trying to wrestle the dressing gown on (one of the sleeves was pulled inside out. Of course.) AND grab my keys (my house is a fricking fire hazard, you have to lock yourself in at night, with KEYS. One day we WILL all die at the bottom of the stairs) AND hope that A.B didn't decide to crawl out of bed and wasn't at this very moment in time lying bleeding on the floor. I got there in the end though, dropped the keys, picked them up, found the right one, opened the door to my postman's right arm, the rest of him already being halfway to the next house. But it was ok, because in this package was clothes I had ordered. My first Maxi dress, a HOODSCARF with EARS and button-eyes (pretty sure Jae will divorce me, but that's ok. I'll have my hoodscarf for comfort), a very cute tea dress, a nautical headband (thick horizontal navy and white stripes with a matt gold helm! So cute!) and a pair of those shoes that are supposed to be small enough to fold up and put in your bag.
I get upstairs and A.B had NOT crawled off the bed. This was the high point of my day.

First of all, the shoes. I bought them in a 6. This was taking into account that I was a 5 and that my feet grew a little while I was pregnant. I figured a 6 was generous enough. I figured wrong. They weren't even big enough for me to get on properly. I screeched 'I AM NOT A FUCKING SEVEN!' at them. They looked back at me silently, as if to say 'Hey lady, if the shoe fits...oh no, wait! BURN!' It is a bad day when you get zinged by your shoes.

Then, my outfit. When we got up and I got dressed, it was SUNNY and WARM, so I basically built my entire idea of what I would wear around that. Then, 20 minutes before we had to leave, the sun is all 'Nah, I'm going back to bed, Laterz.' and I am Fucked. I managed to just about figure out another outfit, but I'm one of those people who cannot tolerate last minute, unexpected change. I don't mind EXPECTED spontaneity. I don't mind if I KNOW I'm not going to know what's happening. But if I plan something and then something comes along and messes it up completely, I get twitchy like a crack addict without a fix.

Then I leave the house and we're running late so despite knowing I should really really really really take the bus, I don't. I get in my car and I decide to drive to the coffee date with the aforementioned mom-friend who isn't actually a friend, just a mom I know. We have literally nothing in common besides the fact that we were both pregnant at about the same time. Almost immediately, I find myself either directly behind or directly in front of a police van. Awesome. Because I'm not a nervous enough wreck, what with the plan-switching and the shoe-mocking and all. No. I need to have a Police Presence. I am, in fact, so busy trying to drive carefully around the police that I fucking crash my car. Ok, I didn't. I dinged it on a width restricter and you can't even tell. But my heart stopped beating and I was roughly 300% positive I'd written my car off. Because I'm an optimist like that.

Next, I didn't have enough change for the meter for very long, so I put in everything I have with the intention of asking for change once I get inside, but they won't give me any and then my 'friend' turns up and I forget about the fucking parking meter in favour of making chit-chat (are you seeing where this is going?). An hour later I realise, and jump up and rush to my lovely beautiful wonderful brand new car to find a bright yellow envelope stuck to it.

Fucking. Awesome.

Oh. Oh, oh, OH, BUT IT GETS BETTER. Because not only was the ding and the outfit and the parking fine and all that enough, no. But as I'm sitting in my care trying to pay the fine I get a tweet through on twitter (no, really? A tweet on twitter? Say it ain't so) telling me that I'd been caught doing something that I technically should not have been doing, and I was in Big Fucking Trouble.

So basically, I had the day from hell and I wish I had woken up on Thursday covered in spots and chosen to spend my day quietly erasing all evidence of my wrongdoing and NOT driving, or parking, or getting dressed. Because that really would have been preferable to the rain of shitness that I was privy to instead.

And I am sending those asshole shoes back and asking for a pair in 6+1. Because I'm not a fucking seven.

Idiot. And Zombies.

It's 3:40am, I have a mild fever (what's up with that? I'm not even sick.) and I have a coffee date with my mom-friend who I get on least well with and have least in common with and am most judged by in 8 hours and I need to sleep at some point, so naturally I decided this was the best time to change my blog layout.

Equally naturally, I did a fucking shitty job, and now it looks shitty. My blog looks like it has a terminal illness. Fucking awesome.

___

So the other day a friend(/psychopath) challenged me to tell her about something that I had invented that someone else had taken credit for, or she was going to kick me out of our secret society and shame me in front of all our friends, and I was all HELL NO BITCH and so I submitted this. For your viewing pleasure:

It was a dark night. I was sweating profusely, my skin taking on a green sheen. The leprosy was taking hold, and worst of all, it was joining forces with the tapeworm. I'd already lost a couple of toes down the back of the sofa and as I slid the needle into my arm, I felt the muscles start to disintegrate and the flesh come apart. The situation was getting seriously fucking dire.

I withdrew a vial of my blood, just enough to complete my experiment. Exhausted, I handed it to my assistants, Raul and Georgie R. I gave them detailed instructions on what to do and shuffled off to rest in the drawing room of my mansion.

Suddenly, I heard a commotion. Something crashed to the floor, there was a roar of anger and outrage. George came streaking out of the labratory, grabbed a broom and ran back. I lifted myself up on my elbow and fell back down when the flesh on my forearm ripped and slid off.

The sound of wood hitting flesh over and over rained down upon my ears for ten minutes, and then silence. There was nothing for 3 hours, and then a low groan that got louder and louder arose. Metal rattled against metal and every now and again I could hear George muttering to himself. 2 days later, he brought in an elixir that cured the strange leprotic illness and 3 days after that, he sent me to a spa for recovery. When I arrived home a week later the labratory had been cleaned out, the corpse was gone, as were George and Raul. There was no evidence of our experiments. This struck fear into my heart, but I decided it was better to let it lie, lest the authorities ask what exactly we were doing in the sewer under the graveyard that night.

I well regretted that though, when my humble assistant turned his hand to film making and a few years later George Romero was some kind of sodding cult hero and rolling in it! I INVENTED ZOMBIES, GOD DAMNIT. WHERE ARE MY FUCKING ROYALTY CHEQUES, HUH? THREE MONTHS OF MY SKIN FALLING OFF FOR FUCKING NOTHING. TWAT.

If you don't read anything else, read this.

Jenny wrote a blog at the beginning of the month that I've only just read (why do I always forget to add her to my sodding bookmarks? Because I'm an idiot, that's why.) and I feel so, so strongly that if you haven't already read it, you must.

"Hi. It's me."

That's all.

It can always get worse.

So, you know how I was whingeing the other day about being tired and wah wah wah, I wasn't going to get any sleep, and oh how terrible my life is? Well then my baby went grey around the mouth and suddenly being tired was seriously the tiniest teeniest least of my problems. We spent all day in A&E, me trying to hold myself together, A.B trying to eat the furniture, Mr A trying to calm me down and keep me calm.

She's fine. But it just goes to show that anytime you think things are bad, they can probably get worse.


I'm having a really grumpy week this week when it comes to food. I'm just absolutely desperate for things I really can't have. We bought some DF chocolate cake today hoping it would tide me over, and it tasted like eating packing peanuts. It was awful. So now I've wasted £4 or whatever it was on cake I'm not going to eat. I snuck some to A.B and she spat it out. Or, rather, she opened her mouth, pulled a face, and thrust her tongue out until it fell to the ground, where she gave it a disgusted look and crawled away. This is the child that will eat dirty socks.

I would chew my own hand off for some cheesecake. Or some scones with jam and cream and real butter. Or a donut! Mr A had donuts today and I don't even like donuts but I WANTED ONE.

My IBS is flaring up something chronic the last day or so too, so I am hungry for things I can't eat for another 3 months at least, and I'm in near constant agonizing pain. Which you'd think would put me off the idea of allergens, but all it does is make me think 'Well if I'm already in pain, what's the harm?' and puts naughty thoughts in my head. And then I have to go 'Remind yourself you said that tomorrow morning at 4am when A.B has chronic diarrhea and is vomiting on your face.' and that's JUST about enough to put me off. For the moment.

I'm so tired and moody, so I will sign off, because at a certain point, it just becomes ranting, and no one likes ranters.

Tired.

So we're getting closer and closer to figuring out what's 'wrong' with me. We think we've cracked it but it's early days. I don't have a terribly sympathetic set of doctors....they already think I'm a raging hypochondriac so going to them with a self-diagnosis is always best avoided. But no one has diagnosed me and they can't diagnose me unless I say something is wrong...therein lies the problem.

This should feel good. It should feel like hunting big game...drawing closer and closer, so tantalizingly close I can hear it's heartbeat and smell its sweat. But it doesn't. It feels like circling the drain, getting further and further down, trying desperately to fight the tide. Because if it is what we think it is, it's not a case of me needing to pull my socks up and get in a good headspace and work out my issues and plow through. Which, much as I hate it and am bad at it, is pretty much the only way I've survived so far. I would have to stop plowing through and start accepting limits, and I'm just not sure how well I can do that.


This morning I am so tired my body aches all over. A.B decided that 4am was an awesome time to wake up for the day, and I hadn't slept, counting on her not waking up til 7:30 so I could rest until then and go to sleep earlier tonight. 3 and a half hours of awake-baby more than I was counting on had me shattered by the time 7:30 rolled around and Mr A left for work. It's 9:40am and I'm near sick with exhaustion. My vision won't keep up with where my head is turning, my muscles feel like they're unravelling, and my stomach is heaving. I need sleep but I can't have it and that's the worst. The aching resentment of being denied what I want so much.

Bah. It's only 9 hours til Mr A gets home. I'll just have to survive somehow. Pity the foo' who cold-calls me today....

Damnit, Janet.

So last night I was lying in bed, drifting off to sleep, and I had THE MOST AWESOME idea for a blog-post ever.
So naturally, I have completely forgotten not only what it was but what it was even vaguely related to. Quelle Surprise!

Instead I'm going to go into some light-hearted heavy talk. Do you mind? I don't care.

I have mentioned in previous posts that I'm physically disabled, and that I have a lot of medical issues, and that I've had a fair few mental health problems. I want to phrase that in a less dramatic way but there just isn't one. It is what it is.
Today I went out to see a friend for coffee. The sun was shining, the weather was pleasant but not TOO warm, and because it's only April, we didn't have the horrible muggy stifling summer air that seems to make Londoners so irate all the time. All in all, it was a really great day to be out. I had a great time chatting with my friend (who is A.B's Godmother) and come time to go home, I decided instead of getting on the bus and jolting about for 40 minutes I was going to stroll partway home. It's not THAT long a walk. At least, it wasn't in my head. Before I started. So I set off, and I have Justin Timberlake and the Glee Soundtrack on my iPod and the weather is awesome and I was feeling great. I got about halfway home and decided to just carry on instead of waiting to get on a bus now. I thought I'd save myself the 90pence.
MISTAKE.
See, I have always been slightly double jointed. Not quite circus-freak bendy, and not as bad as some have it, but my joints don't always stay where they should. This got really bad when I was pregnant when my hips parted like the red fricking sea. I was in absolute agony for most of my pregnancy. Some days I couldn't even walk, because I couldn't make my legs work. They just...wouldn't do what I told them to. All my ligaments and muscles felt stretched and it felt like I was resting a bowling ball on the bones of my pelvis. My doctor essentially told me to suck it up. And I did, and I made it through with no treatment, medication, or even sympathy, because at the time I believed everyone when they told me I was being a great big pansy and I just needed to woman-up and get on with it. Except, since giving birth, my hips now like to play this game where they randomly screw with me. I'll be walking along and suddenly they go funny and I feel like one of those toys where you push down on the base and it releases the tension holding the parts together and they collapse. You know those things? Of course you do. Anyway, that's what happens. Usually I soldier on, lean extra hard on the pushchair and deal with the pain until I can sit down. If it's especially bad, I might actually fall down. This, is embarrassing. But as awful and horrible and annoying as having my hips randomly come apart is, it is good, in a way. Because it helps me feel that what I was going through while pregnant was valid. I WAS in pain. There was a medical problem. They ignored it. I didn't need to 'toughen up'. I needed assistance. I wasn't weak and young and stupid, I was genuinely in trouble.

Validation is a big thing for me. I seek it everywhere, with everything. One particular problem I have is using the label 'disabled'. The United Kingdom government officially recognises me as disabled. Quite a lot, in fact. If I look at it coldly and logically, I know I am. I am less able than the average person. So why do I have such trouble with using that term? Why do I not feel validated? Which is why Mr A ends up yelling at me because I forget my limits and push myself and then end up making myself sick, or messing up my mobility for weeks. Because when you look normal on the outside and everyone expects normality from you, it's hard to remind yourself that what is normal for you is not the same as what is normal for other people.

Why do I need validation when it comes to my pregnancy? It's over, isn't it? It's done with, it's gone, it's in the past. Why dwell on it? Why keep trying to find the hidden meaning in it all?
I think because we always planned to have 3 kids, but then A.B's conception came as a surprise, and I had a very bad pregnancy. I was high risk, I was very ill, and we spent 9 months worried out of our minds. I didn't have it nearly as bad as a lot of people, but I had it bad enough for a 20year old with no friends or family around to lean on for support. So I relied on medical professionals who I can now see let me down terribly. And it was so bad, we decided we could never ever put ourselves through it again. But if I can identify what made my first pregnancy so awful and work on thinking about what I would have done differently if I was given a second chance, then I can open myself up to the possibility of more children.

I got home, in the end, and flopped down onto the sofa, whereupon my legs immediately went numb and my hips set fire to themselves, but I looked at my awesome little girl, pulling on her dad's hair and so close to walking and talking that it aches, and I thought 'This is a good hurt. This s a hurt of opportunity.'

Don't cry over wrongly prescribed milk

There is a running joke among some friends of mine and I that I just cannot catch a break when it comes to Baby A.B's allergy and the associated problems. First off, exclusively breastfeeding a baby is hard. Exclusively breastfeeding a baby when you are physically disabled is really hard. Exclusively breastfeeding a baby when you are physically disabled and then that baby turns out to be very seriously allergic to milk so you have to cut all traces of any dairy whatsoever is really REALLY hard. I lost weight, I got sick, I had no energy, I couldn't eat easily and without having to put a lot of thought into my food (a major major problem for an ex anorexic.), I couldn't eat out, or at other people's houses, I didn't trust anyone to cook for me...it was and is, very very difficult. Cutting out dairy also kicked my dormant intolerance of milk into overdrive, and I am now VERY intolerant of it. Hoorah!
Like I said, cannot catch a fucking break.

Dealing with the Dr's has been some of the worst. First I was told there was no such thing as an allergy to milk, and even if there was, there was no way she would get milk through MY milk. I knew this was wrong, but Mr Doctor Man with his big medical degree decided he was NOT WRONG. Even though he was. He refused to refer me to the Paediatrician I needed to speak to. So I went to a different doctor and got my referral. The paed immediately agreed she had a dairy allergy and said the milk exclusion diet I'd started was the best thing to do and gave me a pat on the back. So we toddled off, happy that our problems seemed solved. But they weren't! Because now her classical reflux was fixed by excluding dairy, she still had silent reflux! Joys! We only saw the paed again at the beginning of March, and she wrote an order for the GP to prescribe us an acidity regulator and some dairy-free formula in case we need it. So we toddle off and collect our medication, but the GP has declined to prescribe the formula, and since I wasn't told the paed had recommended it, I didn't know we were supposed to be receiving it. Then we find out that the medication we've been prescribed is HIDEOUS tasting, and only keeps for a fortnight. So we have to get the prescription filled every two weeks, which is hideously inconvenient when the associated paperwork takes four days. This week the GP also put the formula on the prescription, which Mr A picked up and dropped off, because I was stuck inside staring down the Vacuum Hose of Anxiety, but he gets home and I find out that the GP has only gone and prescribed the wrong formula! The stuff that he's prescribed is a supplement and it isn't even suitable for children her age! It's 12 months plus, and neither he NOR the pharmacist noticed that they'd prescribed and ordered this shit for a fucking 8 month old baby. So I had to go out today and dick around, going from pharmacy to GP's office getting things corrected.

Can someone tell me how I am supposed to trust these people with my and my baby's life when they can't even check age suitability labels when prescribed what is essentially medication?

Twats.

The thing about blogging

The thing about blogging is this:
When you're feeling up, you're too busy being up and out of the house and enjoying life to sit down and commit words to your thoughts, and anyway, what do you have to say? Everything is great! There's only so much you can say about how much stuff rocks.
When you're down, you have plenty to say, but lack either the motivation to sit and figure out your head-fuckery, or the inclination to depress your readers with your woe-is-me bullshit.
So you start a blog, with every intention of updating regularly and using it properly, but then you go through a low patch, and then a high patch, and then another low patch, and before you know it you haven't updated in a month and every day that goes by is another day full of things you don't want to talk about.

The Good:
I have gained weight! I am now pushing 98lbs (7stone for UK readers, 44.5kg to antipodeans) which at almost 5'7 is not great, but it's a darn site better than the 92lbs I'd been hovering at for so long. Hopefully this is the push my body needed to start gaining weight properly.

The Bad:
Money isn't wonderful right now. We had a major one off expense last month that gobbled up Mr A's whole paycheck and sort of crippled us until next payday. We're maxed out, everywhere, and that sucks.

The Ugly:
Today I was ambushed by the worst anxiety attacks I've had in about 2 years. If I thought it was awkward having them before, having them in charge of a 8 month old beastlet impossible. I'm going to have to go beg a doctor to think about prescribing me something, but since I can't even get them to give me an appointment for a medication review for Booby-Breath, I don't know how much luck I'll have.

Ciao, beautiful people.